Lofty offered me. And another word: Whenever you want a favor you
come to me!"

Johnny walked into the Lofty establishment with the feeling of a
Napoleon. "How much will you give me for the Ersten lease?" he
suggested out of a clear sky.

Young Willis Lofty sighed in sympathy with his bank-account.

"Have you really secured it?" he asked.

"I'm the winner," Johnny cheerfully assured him.

"If it's too much I'll build that tunnel," warned Lofty.

"Make me an offer."

"A hundred and twenty-five thousand."

"Nothing doing," stated Johnny with a smile. "There's no use fussing
up our time though. I can tell you, to the cent, how much I must
have. At four o'clock to-day I shall be nineteen hours behind my
schedule, and I want a day for a fresh start, which makes it twenty-
six. At five thousand an hour, that makes a hundred and thirty
thousand dollars. I paid Ersten a hundred thousand. Grand total: two
hundred and thirty thousand."

"I don't understand your figures," protested Lofty.

"It's a private code," laughed the leaseholder, "but that's the